274 DARWINIANISM 



think of what, from the nature of the case, in plant or 

 animal, among all possible imaginable chances, the first 

 could only be, we feel it difficult to conceive of any sucli 

 abstract, isolated, single accident ever developing into 

 such a concrete entity as a species. Of possible first 

 differences in a plant (and, L 98, iii. 333, it always 

 pleases Mr. Darwin to exalt plants), there may be, as I 

 put it elsewhere, some initial new streak, some initial 

 new caruncle, nodule, tubercle, alto-relievo, or basso- 

 relievo, some mere dimple, or some mere lip, some mere 

 initial fold, pucker, some mere stain even some mere 

 slight increase, some mere slight decrease, some mere 

 slight change of shape, some mere slight change of 

 direction even. Such changes, as hollows, may be 

 fabled, to fashion new joints, or, as growths, new fibrils, 

 tentacles, tendrils, etc. ; but can they be more than 

 fabled ? So in Mr. Darwin's own instances of animals ; 

 the bird with its ! J th of an inch of more beak ; the 

 elephant with a tusk a little more to the left or a little 

 more to the right, up, or down ; the bear that takes to 

 the water, the bat, the seal, the British insect. I do not 

 think that the imaginary narrative which we have offered 

 of the bird transformed into a woodpecker will strike any 

 one as unfair ; and is it anything more or better than a 

 mere story for children ? Let us compare such trans- 

 formation at the hands of nature with that, say, of a 

 rock-pigeon into a fantail at the hands of the fancier. 

 How different they are how incomparable they are '. 

 And Mr. Darwin invites the comparison : he names quite 

 in the same breath (L 314) " the accumulated variations 

 by which the beautifully adapted woodpecker has been 

 formed," and " the enlarged crop of the pouter, or tail of 

 the fantaiL" The fancier, pairing, again and again, and 

 yet again, like exceptional tail with like exceptional tail, 

 converts a rock-pigeon into a fantaiL But conceive 



